Welcome to Gaia! ::

A recent thread in the main forums brought out a lot of interesting perspectives from people. So as for probably the first extended discussion topic in the Other Side, I ask this question:

What are your views on religion and faith?

- Is faith a means for strengthening oneself? Or a mere delusion?
- Is there a higher power?
- Do humans really need morals?
- Has religion done more harm than good?

And so on...

Discuss.

Very true. It's one of the main problems that I see when it comes to religion. Tolerance and respect for another person's belief is ultimately at the lowest when it comes to big-name religions, especially that of Christianity.

Don't get me wrong (I doubt there are any major Christians around here anyways), I'm not attacking the religion itself but moreso the people that run it. And I'm not basing my thoughts simply on all of the stories and other things I see flawed, but I base this on my own experiences.

I use to be a Christian at one point, I've been there. It was when I was younger, when my father was still around, and I really had not developed the process of questioning everything, let alone the strength to tell my Dad I didn't think I was on board with everybody else at the church.

So I would sit in the church with everyone else and feel like I was completely different for a couple years until eventually my dad sort of dropped from the church itself and moved away.

Since then, I began looking into other things, other religions while taking note of how cruel a number of hypocritical Christians could be to someone different from them. I had been different that entire time in church, but I never said much so no one really knew. I thought, "So if I admitted to a church this, would they cast me aside as well?" It was around middle school, and I wore darker clothes and listened to KoRn. "Would they even let me walk two feet back into the church if I came dressed like this?"

It was never a matter of the religion, I realized. It was a matter of fitting into some process, like a club of some sorts. The more I think about it, the more I realize that religion could be nothing more than being a major fan of some book, let's say Harry Potter as an example, and then getting together with a big group of other Harry Potter fans and talking about what your favorite part of the book was.

There is almost no difference between the two, except religion tries to place morals and tips for bettering one's life. This is where the Crack of Christianity begins to start, as it does for all religions.

Not every moral or commandment can be followed by everyone. We're all different; some people are open-minded, some are closed, some see a "sin" as an everyday event that can be dealt with, while others hide away from it all in a frightened attempt to be what someone else perceived as "good".

I believe humans know right from wrong. Whether it's a strong value or a fractured one, we all know the difference when the Id, Ego and Superego* all start debating in our heads. If raised properly, I see no difference in the moral values of an atheist and a Christian, except the Christian ties God down to the situation. "I can't do that, I'm a Christian," whereas the atheist would say, "I really don't want anything to do with that. I think it's wrong."

(*Psychology reference to the "angel and devil on your shoulder" and the judge that decides who is right between the two.)

Now our Crack in religion has gotten a bit bigger. The atheist seems more firm on their belief, whereas the Christian seems to use their faith as an excuse-- whether to avoid ridicule, depending on the situation between right and wrong, or because their mind is warped and they believe they can't think for themselves and try and let God think for them. The atheist appears to have the most strength in the situation. And I've seen this a numerous amount of times between the faithful and the faithless.

If faith can give someone the strength they feel they need to get up out of their rut and better their life, (like our friend Brian) then that's fine. It works for them. However, it must be understood by everyone that someone could do the exact same thing without faith.

Religious propaganda always fails to see this, using people's turn-around stories as flags to wave high in the air as one of their highest examples of their faith. (While making gallons of money in the process.) They never see other people and different methods-- in fact they probably don't want to accept that God is not always the answer.

Look at all of us here in the guild. A number of us have been in that rut before, and it was KoRn that helped us back up.

Music probably saves more people than God can, because it's a real someone down here with us, talking about the real things that effect us and make us feel that way we do. I know we've all said more than once that Jonathan Davis is God.

It's probably no different than some religious follower who was saved by faith, by the Bible. That method was there for them when they were in a bad spot, so that's the method they will stick to.

So, faith is just a perspective. It's not always a mean for strengthening oneself, but it has and can, but it's not a complete delusion either. It's a matter of what works for someone. But as always, the religious ones fail to see this, blinded by their faith into thinking that this method will work for every single person on this planet.

The Crack deepens.

Everyone "saved" by God, especially at first, goes out trying to convert everyone. Their new-found faith is like a painkilling drug that they want everyone to try. Look at Brian, what was one of the first few things he did when he got saved? He tried to convert everyone-- Jonathan Davis at that, who has, for his entire life, had rough feelings about faith and organized religion. Brian failed to see that, yet he had been with Jonathan for over a decade and the singer has an entire sleeve of tattoos showing what he thinks religion is.

They begin to disrespect and talk lowly of people who had turned down their religious drug, not even realizing that they are going against one of the Ten Commandments in doing so. Look at the fight that broke out between Brian and Jonathan after Brian left. Brian started it. He was frustrated that he wasn't able to "save" them and resorted to being what makes us all human by starting s**t with the media as a shield, pissing off every KoRn fan while doing so.

But since then, Head thankfully was able to get out of that terrible cycle and realize that he was doing something wrong. Now everything, for the most part, is fixed and the fighting has stopped.

Now the Crack comes down to the end of the wall near the floor. It breaks into a fork and part of it goes left and the other part goes right. The part that goes right continues sideways down the wall, getting longer and longer and longer, whereas the part of the Crack that breaks off to the left goes downward to the floor and stops.

Looking at religion, it is easy to admit that it has been that cause of many unpleasant things. Corruption, hypocrisy, murder, war...it's all been done in the name of God. But it was done by those misguided and lost.

It's the people that become crazed over religion that cause the harm, but not the religion itself. There are a number of good things that come from religion; afterall it ties people together and makes them feel valued and empowers them. They generally are nice people who have a faith in something they believe has brought good to them and their families.

But unfortunately, and especially in today's world, it's becoming rare and we're stuck with the psychotic religious radicles that get under your skin and make you want to vomit all over yourself because their view is so disgusting representing an entire religious population (example: the warped beliefs of the ******** Phelps family). We get corrupt priests raping their church's alter boys and terrorists killing mass amounts of people in the name of their God.

So, looking at the big picture, religion has and is causing more harm than good, but I don't believe it was ever intended to. The wrong people got the right power and we're left to deal with the misguided and hypocritical ******** we've all known and dealt with.

But we have a choice.

We either take to the right in our Crack, and follow it down the wall in a jagged path forever, judging everyone we see fit in the name of God, or we take to the left and just

s t o p . . .

...and live life the way religion originally intended for us. To just respect everyone and live in peace.

Whether you need God or you don't, do what works for you. Never feel inclined to follow something you don't feel strongly about. Have a voice, do or don't do something because of what YOU believe, and not what a Church believes or a friend believes.

And never ever live in fear of someone else's God.

Someone may condemn you based on their opinion, but they aren't God, or to an atheist, they are not you. They are someone with a different and twisted opinion of what they feel is right, and they love having the power of God. They love watching people change due to what they said, to change based on their belief, to change for them.

And if there is one thing we all learned from KoRn, it's to never change for anybody. Be yourself, let you come through. Never let a person or God himself tell you otherwise.




Edit: OMG...I wrote a lot. Sorry guys! I guess I got carried away. ^^;

Wow, this discussion is turning out to be great!

Let me start off by saying that despite the views some of you may have seen me convey in various posts that I am by no means an Atheist. I’ve effectively called myself a “rational theist” – meaning I believe in a higher power, but value Reason and Logic more than anything ‘divine’ – there are no miracles; everything can be explained logically in the end. However, this is where it complicates magnificently; the term itself “rational theist” is a paradox, how can one be logical when they believe in a higher power? The solution is simple, as I have figured out – logic will show that not all things can be explained by science, there are things seen guided by an unseen, and at times a wonderful confluence of events – in layman’s terms “things just falling into place”, fate per se. To me, there is an invisible push that moves all things in this universe, the impetus behind the cause which yields an effect, be it positive or negative. The Atheists among you may ask me “why then, can’t we see this god (or whatever you which to call this anonymous higher power)?” My answer is, humans as we know are not perfect, maybe we just simply lack the physical sense to perceive this invisible higher power.

I also have to say, I actually started off being extremely Roman Catholic. I was in fact, quite devout in my childhood because I was brought up that way. Being Filipino meant having Roman Catholicism play a huge part in your life. As I grew older, I began to see and question – I saw more than the small scope of reality Catholicism offered. I read more science literature, more philosophy, astronomy, history, mythology and theology, consequently gaining more insight into the way humans worked. I saw Catholicism to be a human creation, the Bible to be lore – the failings of having too much faith, the hypocrisy, the radicals, and the negativity of having your mind closed to ecumenism. My family resented this (and still do, especially my dad who studied Christian theology and is very defensive). My father considers me ‘blasphemous’ and both my parents are STILL working to try and “turn me back” to the Church, believing that it will give me guidance. I’m sorry, but I can’t see why listening to a priest ramble on about redundant and unrealistic views will not give me guidance, only I can guide myself and only I can see the paths I wish to take. I also dabbled a bit with Atheism and Satanism at about 13 years old – I actually used to write disrespectful scathing blogs about how ‘crap’ the Church was to a steady fan base (I hear from them rarely now though). As I matured, I began to realise that writing irrationally disrespectful scathing articles about something I don’t agree with was doing exactly what a religious fundamentalist would. My views have certainly tempered down as you can see; I realised some of the paths Satanism has to offer are dangerous and convoluted (the basic principles are good though) and Atheism to be fundamentally illogical (my view, not attacking anyone!).

The concept of a religious deity, Judeo-Christian or Islamic I believe, is indeed a man-made concept. Personally, I view this as an innate instinct in humans to ‘know’ that there is something else out there beyond our comprehension – and some humans will seek to explain the inexplicable through the use of lore: hence the Bible, Qur’an, mythology etc. It is through these varying attempts to explain the higher power that conflict arises one view will say that their view is more superior to the other, and so on. Fanaticism toward one point of view is, as proven by history, very destructive. To me there is a god, but it belongs to no religion – all these other religions only serve to be philosophically dialectic (Hegel’s model of philosophy) to me – one view is a thesis, the other is an antithesis. I choose to not to see one view exclusively, but see the synthesis of these views to further my own understanding.

All that aside, I am by no means saying my view is correct, and you may challenge it if you wish. On a whole, I agree with you Dani. I especially commend the real-world examples you gave. I don’t need to really need to elaborate on anything you’ve said as we share pretty similar views when it comes to religious fanaticism and Christian ignorance and hypocrisy. What started as a simple explanation for the intangible has gotten way out of hand – it has become accepted as hard “fact”. Biblical evidence is used as datum to back up arguments, thus limiting progress and turning ‘facts of life’ into dangerous logical fallacies.

Also, religion and morals are not synonymous. An Atheist can still be a better person than a Christian, provided they live their life in a manner than does not harm any living being. Morals and ethics are still innate in most humans, and they should know what is right without having a religion dictate it so. The human animal is fascinating in many aspects, what makes us different from other animals is the capacity for reason. It is reason what dictates moral values and ethics. We know it’s wrong to murder, rape, do drugs etc. Choice and other innate attributes which exist in humans (and environmental factors determining such) is what makes other humans falter – faith (or the guise of) will not make anything or better.

Anyway... damn I typed a whole essay here xD. Like I said, these are my views and if you wish to challenge me on anything, feel free to. No view is right or wrong, and at times we can only agree to disagree.

Theism literally means to believe in a higher power, a god or set of gods. The term gave way to deism (which is closer to what I personally believe), in which this 'god' is present within science as part of natural law. God can be explained logically, not through mysticism. "Anti-theism" is basically atheism, it is the doctrine in which one denies the exsitence of a higher power, and argues that it's existance cannot be proven.

Keep in mind though, that we rational deists pretty much differ from one another. We're not exactly an organised, whole group of people and our ideas of 'god' are mostly personal (though largely similar). Rational deism/theism is more of a philosphical state subject to argument than a doctrine




Sort of. Take it through the strain of logic (cause and effect). My version of the higher power is the reason behind the cause, the effect is the universe. So therefore, 'god' is the push that allowed the the Big Bang and evolution to begin; the Big Bang is the cause - the universe is the effect.
My beliefs are a tad different, because unlike most religious folks who oppose science, I just think god is a part of it. Put at its simplest: god is the explanation to the unexplained, and will reveal itself as we become more rational.
To address the life question, yes - I believe god makes life the way it is; but stands as a largely dormant force only few can evoke, and rarely can be evoked. Humans make their own choices based on their conscience and convenience.



That is correct, LaVeyan Satanism is related to rational Hedonism and is more of a philosophy than a religion as well. Satan is the left hand path, the alternate route in life. It pretty much champions Man as the 'gods' of their own destinies. It allows for all actions than benefit the individual, as long as it does not harm others without proper justification. As you can see, it can be pretty dangerous to the wrong people xD.



Buddhism is a beautiful, albeit rather complicated religion. I like some of their doctrines, and they're pretty harmless and very tolerant of others as well. Out of all major world religions, they are the most harmless as they do not push their beliefs on others. Ever heard of wars started in the name of Buddhism? None. However, like you I can't bring myself to believe in mysticism - but I do adopt some of what they believe in daily life. Meditation and personal reflection is a good thing smile

For me...religion is pointless...I would rather NOT live my life in the fear that one day a few mistakes or lapses in judgement may get me sent to a damned palce and besides....actual religous people aren't supposed to jusge then why would god be allowed? that seems a bit hypocritical. *shrugs* just my opinion.

Thanks for your views --KoRn-Iz-Jashin--, you certainly do hold an interesting perspective on this matter smile



Really? xD Wow, I've never actually noticed in all my years of perusing through that self-proclaimed 'document of faith'. True that man has taken and revised the bible, and there are at least 7 or so versions depending on the denomination's edition - the most common being the 'King James'. Now, the original bible was written in Aramaic, Hebrew and Greek - it was the European attempt to translate the bible that resulted in ********. For example, one of the de Medici popes wanted Mary Magdalene to be a 'whore', so they changed the meaning of the original Aramaic ' loyal companion' to 'whore'. Reason being? Probably because they were insecure about powerful women influencing Jesus. As for governments physically changing something within the bible, I gotta disagree with you there xD. There has never been any tangible evidence to suggest the government of any sovereign nation knowingly manipulating sacred texts. Perhaps you meant that their actual interpretation of the texts have been used to manipulate their populations - because that happens constantly.




Hell, that scares me too. The way some religious songs are written are purely disturbing. I don't know what's up with that either neutral .




Ah Atheism. I have a bone to pick with the ideal that is Atheism (not your views though, just the whole premise itself). I've dabbled in atheism when I was growing up too, as I felt the confines of my Roman Catholic upbringing were placing terrible restrictions on my intellectual development. But the more I thought about things in perspective, tossing aside all my frustration with Christianity and bias toward rationalism... I cannot find a good reason to deny the presence of a supreme being. Though it's the fact that people feel the need to actively 'worship' this supreme being is still beyond me.

I've said before (somewhere), the whole premise of atheism is severely flawed; simply because by saying 'god does not exist', acknowledges the existence of a god in the first place. In other words, to deny the existence of something is to acknowledge it exists in the first place. Atheism for me, is just the result of pure humanistic pride and vanity - it takes away the wonder in things like natural world (but that's a whole new argument altogether).


That's my intellectual drabble for the day xD. Again, thanks for posting here... I simply thrive on discussions like this. If you have another topic in mind, feel free to post it up smile

From the looks of it. . .I'm one of the few people here with any belief system. That's surprising, since I'm usually the one who gets weird looks for not believing. Or for believing in something unusual.

I wasn't raised Christian, or under any religion for that matter. My mom decided not to, because she didn't want to force her children into anything. So I have always questioned organized religion, especially Christianity. The thing that actually scared me though, was the monotheism of it. I couldn't understand how one being could hold SO much power. If they made one wrong move, the whole world could come apart. (and it HAS)

When I was in middle school, though, I started reading about a religion that I felt might actually be right for me. It isn't organized in any way, promotes open minds, and has few concrete rules, the most important of them being: do not harm others.

I will probably fully convert one day, but for now, *shrug* I just go with the flow. I do agree with what most people say against Christianity, because so little of it makes sense. How did one man who promoted love and acceptance turn into war, death, sexism, homophobia, and racism??

*laughs* I'm BACK!!! Yeah, it took me forever. Basic (2 months), then Tech (2 months) then a search for WiFi (2 months). Anyway. . .

I think you misread my comment before though, I wasn't raised as Christian, or as any formal religion.

XD The religion I'm alluding to is Wicca.